Espionage High Flyer

Uncovering an undercover

Telling his wife that he was dashing off to Paris on an official mission, he kissed her goodbye on a January morning in 1984, then caught a cab to Oslo's Fornebu Airport. Once there, however, Arne Treholt, 42, the up-and-coming head of the Norwegian Foreign Ministry's press office, checked in for a flight to Vienna. His alleged plan: to meet with Gennadi Titov, a Soviet KGB agent, and hand him Foreign Ministry secrets.

Treholt missed his date. As he was about to board his plane he was arrested by two Norwegian counterintelligence agents. His briefcase was found to contain 66 documents,...